hat Belsta, and
Heidr, and Hulla of old, the wolf-riders, the men-devourers, could win to
the uttermost secrets of galdra, though applied only to purposes the
direst and fellest to man, and that I, though ever in the future,--I,
though tasking the Nornas not to afflict a foe, but to shape the careers
of those I love,--I find, indeed, my predictions fulfilled; but how
often, alas! only in horror and doom!"

"How so, kinswoman, how so?" said Githa, awed yet charmed in the awe, and
drawing her chair nearer to the mournful sorceress. "Didst thou not
fortell our return in triumph from the unjust outlawry, and, lo, it hath
come to pass? and hast thou not" (here Githa's proud face flushed)
"foretold also that my stately Harold shall wear the diadem of a king?"

"Truly, the first came to pass," said Hilda; "but----" she paused, and
her eye fell on the cyst; then breaking off she continued, speaking to
herself rather than to Githa--"And Harold's dream, what did that portend?
the runes fail me, and the dead give no voice. And beyond one dim day,
in which his betrothed shall clasp him with the arms of a bride, all is
dark to my vision--dark--dark. Speak not to me, Githa; for a burthen,
heavy as the stone on a grave, rests on a weary heart!"

A dead silence succeeded, till, pointing with her staff to the fire, the
Vala said, "Lo, where the smoke and the flame contend--the smoke rises in
dark gyres to the air, and escapes, to join the wrack of clouds. From
the first to the last we trace its birth and its fall; from the heart of
the fire to the descent in the rain, so is it with human reason, which is
not the light but the smoke; it struggles but to darken us; it soars but
to melt in the vapour and dew. Yet, lo, the flame burns in our hearth
till the fuel fails, and goes at last, none know whither. But it lives
in the air though we see it not; it lurks in the stone and waits the
flash of the steel; it coils round the dry leaves and sere stalks, and a
touch re-illumines it; it plays in the marsh--it collects in the
heavens--it appals us in the lightning--it gives warmth to the air--life
of our life, and the element of all elements. O Githa, the flame is the
light of the soul, the element everlasting; and it liveth still, when it
escapes from our view; it burneth in the shapes to which it passes; it
vanishes, but its never extinct."

So saying, the Vala's lips again closed; and again both the women sate
silent by the great fi